Most El Dorado Hills homeowners who contact us have been thinking about getting their estate planning done for a while. They own a home, they have a family, and they know a living trust is probably the right move. What stops them is not knowing what it actually costs or what the process looks like.
This post answers both questions.
Clark Allison has been doing California estate planning for 30 years. We do two things: estate planning and trust administration. That's it. No litigation, no family law, no personal injury. Every process, every attorney, and every system in this firm is built around those two things. Our El Dorado Hills office is our home base, and our local attorneys, Jennifer Ferraiuolo, Nora Hall, and Tristan L’Engle, are here to help you protect your family. And when you work with us, you work directly with one of our attorneys from start to finish. Not a paralegal after the first meeting. Not a case manager who passes messages. You work directly with an attorney.
El Dorado Hills is not a starter-home market. The median home price is around $900,000, and many families have owned their homes long enough to watch them appreciate well past that. Add in bank accounts, brokerage accounts, and retirement assets accumulated over a career, and a lot of EDH families have built something significant without necessarily thinking of themselves as wealthy enough to need estate planning.
They do. Here's why.
Take a fairly typical El Dorado Hills scenario: a home worth $1,000,000 and bank and brokerage accounts totaling $500,000. That's $1,500,000 in assets subject to California probate if there's no living trust.
California probate fees are calculated on the gross value of your estate, before deducting any mortgage. On a $1,500,000 estate:
Total: $64,000 or more. Plus 12 to 18 months in probate court. Plus, everything on public record.
A living trust estate plan can avoid this.
Most attorneys in the area don't post their fees, which makes it hard to know what you're walking into. We do. Here's the breakdown:
DIY services (LegalZoom, Trust & Will): $500 or less. Documents only. No attorney, no customization, no deed. Fine for a single person with minimal assets. Not a realistic option if you own property in El Dorado Hills.
New or generalist attorneys: $1,500–$2,500. A licensed attorney, but estate planning may not be their primary focus. Experience with California-specific situations varies.
Dedicated estate planning firms: $3,000–$7,500. Our fee is $3,000 for most individuals, $4,000 for most married couples. Flat fee. You work directly with your attorney throughout the process, not with layers of staff.
Bay Area, Los Angeles and San Diego firms: $7,500–$10,000+. Same California law, significantly higher overhead passed along to you. We work virtually with a number of clients from those markets who prefer our experience and process without the premium pricing.
High-net-worth or complex situation specialists: $7,500–$10,000+. Appropriate for blended families, business succession, significant federal estate tax planning, or multi-state assets. For a straightforward married couple with an EDH home and standard distribution goals, it's more than you need to spend.
A living trust is not one document. It's a coordinated set of documents that have to work together. A gap anywhere in the package can cause the whole plan to fail when your family needs it most.
A complete estate plan from Clark Allison includes:
That last item is where a lot of plans quietly fail. A trust that isn't funded doesn't work. If your home is still titled in your individual name when you die, it goes through probate regardless of how carefully the trust documents were drafted. We prepare and record the deed for our clients.
Some attorneys charge hourly. The total might land near a flat fee, or it might not. You find out when the bill arrives.
We charge flat fees, and we tell you the price before you start. No guessing.
And once you're a client, questions are free. Call us, email us, ask what you need to ask. No billable hour waiting on the other end. If you need actual amendments to your documents down the road, that's a separate flat fee. But asking whether you need them is not.
Many law firms bill for every six-minute increment of their time. We don't. Over the life of an attorney-client relationship, that's a real difference.
Two meetings with your attorney. We do the work in between. Most El Dorado Hills families have a completed, signed, and funded estate plan within two to three weeks.
If you'd rather not come in, virtual estate planning by Zoom works just as well. Two video calls, a signing session we coordinate from your home, and you're done.
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes. We prepare the grant deed to transfer your El Dorado Hills home into the trust and record it with the El Dorado County Recorder. Included in the flat fee. Some firms charge separately for this step. Others leave it to the client entirely. An unfunded trust is one of the most common and most preventable failures we see.
Possibly. California law has changed meaningfully over the years, and so have estate tax thresholds, Prop 19 rules, and beneficiary situations. If your plan is more than five or six years old, or if your assets or family have changed significantly since you signed it, a review makes sense.
With an attorney, start to finish. At some firms, the first meeting is with an attorney and the rest of the process is handed off to paralegals or case managers. That's not how we work. Your attorney handles your plan from the initial conversation through your signed, funded trust.
No. We offer complete virtual estate planning by Zoom. If you prefer in person, our El Dorado Hills office is at 4944 Windplay Dr., Ste. 117.
Two to three weeks for most families. Two meetings. We handle the documents, notary coordination, and the deed.
The flat fee for married couples covers both spouses: a joint living trust, individual wills, individual powers of attorney, individual health care directives, and the deed for your home. All in, $4,000 for most clients.
Mostly. The initial plan is a flat fee. You should revisit it every few years or after significant life changes: a new grandchild, a divorce in the family, buying additional property, or a major shift in assets. Updates are a separate flat fee. Questions about whether you need one are always free.
Thirty years of California estate planning. Estate planning and trust administration is all we do. Attorneys who work with you directly, start to finish. Flat fees with no surprises. And once you’re a client, it’s free to ask us questions.
Call us (916) 983-9410 or click Get Started below to schedule a free 15-minute call with one of our attorneys. We can help you sort out what you need and the price to set up your California estate plan.
We serve families in person at our El Dorado Hills office at 4944 Windplay Dr., Ste. 117, El Dorado Hills. We also work with clients at our Roseville, San Diego, and San Luis Obispo offices, and virtually from anywhere in California.